2017 in Review: Looking Forward

Some hopes and (tentative, as ever) plans for 2018.

As I do every year, I’ve been making some goals for myself for 2018. I’m breaking these down into three big categories this year, having learned from the experience of summarizing my goals for last year:

Standing aims: things that I can’t exactly check off as done, but which are extremely important to me.

Goals: things I can mark as done.

Primary: the most important of my goals—the ones I’ll count myself as having failed in some way if I don’t accomplish them over the course of the year (barring major unforeseen goings-on, which are, well… impossible to foresee).

Flexible: other goals, which I’d like to get to, but which it won’t bother me if I don’t get to them.

Standing aims

Integrate well into our new church—including finding specific ways and places to serve regularly, joining a small group, and making some good friends.

Spend more, better, and more consistent time with my family.

Work hard at Olo.

Goals

Primary

Podcasting:

Ship a minimum of 3 episodes of New Rustacean per month January—October.

That seems like plenty to go after this year. One thing that isn’t apparent here is that a fair bit of this is aimed at goals that extend past this year. There are things I want to do in the first half of my thirties if possible, of which some of these are a part. I don’t have those kinds of things written down (and when I write them down, I probably won’t publish them here!) but as I come into the broad swath of life that is just “adulthood”—not young adulthood or old age—I am increasingly mindful of the kinds of things I want to do that take more than a single year to accomplish. Some of these move the needle substantially in that direction, so hopefully I’ll get there!